Thursday, February 7, 2008

Dating Dead Men

DATING DEAD MEN: Harley Jane Kozak: Doubleday: Mystery: 326 pages

Wollie Shelley has a lot going on. Her greeting card store is being inspected by headquarters, she’s participating in a dating research project that sends her out with different men every night, and she’s just discovered a dead body on the driveway to the mental hospital where her brother lives. Caught up in the murder with an attractive ex-con on the lam, Wollie hurries to solve the crime before the Mafia, responsible for the murder, decides she knows too much.

Kozak’s mysteries have been compared to Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum novels. There’s less language and objectionable content in Kozak’s first book than in Evanovich’s series, which many readers will appreciate, but there’s also less humor and a less appealing romance. Still, Wollie is a likeable character who gets into amusing scrapes, and the story moves along at a nice pace. Fans of chick lit and light-hearted mysteries will enjoy this series.

MBC

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